On Nov 17, two dozen tornadoes landed in southern Illinois leaving irreversible damages to towns including Washington.

   The town of Washington was the most severely hit leaving 2,400 homes damaged or completely destroyed by the tornadoes.

   The tornado caused a total of eight deaths to date and other small damages.

   The town of Washington residents began reparations the day after with state troopers surrounding the area. They stacked up piles of debris and the CAT corporation in nearby Peoria donated some bulldozers to help the citizens with this effort. The goal was to bring these piles to the county dump.

    “As a whole some major reparations will need to be made to Washington in order to rebuild homes,” Sheriff Charlie Parker said.

   The path of the tornado went diagonally through the town of Washington, making it possible for some houses to be completely destroyed and others totally untouched on the same block. Personal efforts were made to clean up yards; glass was littered throughout front yards and into the local ponds.

   In a darker turn of events, looters took advantage of the fact that houses were empty and some untouched houses ended up losing everything because the residents could not be at home.

   Efforts will continually be made to repair the neighborhood, and experts estimate the clean up could take up to a year.